


Nothing I Want More

by onetiredboy



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Other, SOFT AS FUCK, jupeter content yall im GAY, man in glass missing scene, post man in glass, tender fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-26
Updated: 2020-01-27
Packaged: 2021-02-27 10:02:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,736
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22415179
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onetiredboy/pseuds/onetiredboy
Summary: (There is nothing I want more than to stay.)Juno is… just looking at Peter.
Relationships: Peter Nureyev/Juno Steel
Comments: 34
Kudos: 250





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> not sure how i feel abt the style of this one but o well im yearning

_There is nothing I want more than to stay._

Juno is… just looking at Peter.

Neither of them has said anything in a while, and Juno is just watching him, a look of determination and fear and… hope, all in one. Determination in his set eyebrows, furrowed and certain. Fear in his eye, shining and flickering. Hope in his lips, left parted and vulnerable.

Then the face changes. Lips close, eyebrows relax, eyes look away entirely. “I’m sorry,” he says, “You probably need some, uh… time, or…”

“No, wait,” Peter says. Too quickly. His brain hasn’t made up its mind yet but his heart, apparently, certainly has, and seems capable of bypassing his common sense completely, because as Juno stands Peter grabs his wrist.

“I-I-I,” Peter stutters, like a complete and utter idiot, while Juno stares back at him, until suddenly his brain catches up, “I just… didn’t know what to say, that’s all.”

“And… do you know what to say now?” Juno prompts carefully, while sinking back down onto the bed beside him.

There it rises again – Peter Nureyev is not the forgiving kind of man. Or is he? Is Peter Nureyev the cold and calculating master thief? Or is he the teenage revolutionary with a lover’s heart – the one who should’ve died twenty years ago, but has been stowing away in the back of his mind ever since? In his heart, he knows, he forgave Juno a long, long time ago, but did _he_ forgive him or somebody else? And would Peter Nureyev admit it?

Peter Nureyev is not an honest man – yet. But he could be. It’s a decision he could make, now, just to prove that he could. Just to prove he is no longer a product of his environment.

And so he settles on saying, simply, “No.”

(Being honest, he decides, feels awful. The vulnerability prickles on his skin. The urge to suddenly take it back and replace it with some smoother sentiment tugs at his mind, but now that the truth is out he can think of nothing else).

“Okay,” Juno says, still too calm and quiet than the man Peter knew all that time ago, “That’s alright.”

“I want you to stay,” Peter continues. Like puncturing a hole in a sandbag, this falls easily out after the first admission. He’s done it once, he can do it again: be honest. It feels a small victory to even be uncomfortable in the first place – evidence of his conscious manipulation of his environment.

Does he have feelings for this new Juno Steel? He wants to find out. This is a Juno not here for the saving. This is a Juno who has learned much and could teach more. Nureyev has always been an eager pupil.

“Okay,” Juno says again. He seems to be bordering on something more for a moment. His shoulders and chest rise with a breath, and then for a split second something crosses his face – a look of amusement mixed with embarrassment, and he laughs softly and shakes his head to himself.

“What?” Peter presses.

“I—nothing. It’s just funny being here, is all. I worried about this moment so much.”

It isn’t all. Peter watches Juno out of the corner of his eye. He fidgets with the end of the soft grey shirt he changed into before coming here. It’s a good look on him. It compliments the dark brown of his skin and the curve of his soft belly and the muscles in his shoulders and arms. At least one thing about Juno hasn’t changed – he’s just as attractive to Peter as he was when they first met, just the sight of him enough to put a little stir in the bottom of his stomach.

Juno’s hands still suddenly. He stares at a spot ahead of him. His whole body is tensed; on the precipice of something. Peter watches intently.

Juno heaves in a big sigh and turns towards him on the bed. That same look flickers over his face again – embarrassment and amusement, and then he says. “This is going to sound… so incredibly stupid.”

For a second, the old Peter Nureyev is back, and he flashes a short, sharp smile, “I can’t wait to hear it, then.”

“Can I…” Juno starts, and then stops. And then starts, “Can I have… a hug?”

In the time it takes for Peter’s brain to restart, Juno adds, “I understand if you don’t… wanna touch me, or, like… have physical contact right now, I just—” he makes a few aborted sounds and then shrugs both his shoulders, “I just…really want…to know we’re okay, I guess. I’ve been trying this new thing called opening up, uh… not really… sure how it’s working out for me. Feels kind of shit most of the time, actually, but… Rita says I’m getting better.”

“Yes,” Peter says, and stands up.

“Yes?” Juno furrows his brows at him, and then—“Oh. Oh, yeah, duh.”

He flashes one of his quick, firelight smiles, and stands up as well. There’s a moment of quiet hesitation in the room, and then Juno steps forward and wraps his arms around Nureyev’s torso.

He’s warm. Incredibly so. His arms are solid around Nureyev’s lean body, in a way that is… well, comforting. Nureyev isn’t sure what to do with his arms, decides it’ll be over soon enough. But the hug stretches on, Juno pressed against Nureyev’s body, and the next time Peter becomes aware of himself, his own arms have unwound from their stiff position at his sides to curl around Juno’s waist. He leans his head down so that his face is buried in Juno’s curls.

Juno smiles against Nureyev’s chest and mutters, “I just wanted to feel you again. I know I’m not allowed to, not when I’m the one who left, but… I missed you, Nureyev.”

Nureyev just pulls Juno closer against him and holds him tight. He has the absurd impulse to cry. His body feels… strange. Warm and soft, like melting butter, but aching as well.

Juno smells different. He reeks less of alcohol, though it’s still there, underneath the unique, unnameable smell of _him_. The last time Nureyev could smell Juno this close to him, Juno was breathless in the blankets underneath him, and looking at him like he’d never wanted anything else so much. (And Nureyev had actually believed him. Fool me once…)

But that’s not what he wants to think about right now. He moves his arms on Juno’s back and Juno makes a contented little sound and squeezes him.

“You still have that cologne,” Juno mutters, and then laughs and pulls back, “Unfair.”

“How so?”

“Just—” he says, and stops himself. Then he laughs again and puts his head against Nureyev’s collarbone, “You know what that smell does to me.”

“Stay the night,” Nureyev says.

Juno pulls back from Nureyev’s chest to stare at him, and the way Juno looks at him…Like he’s never wanted anything else so much. It clenches Nureyev’s breath. (Fool me twice…)

And then Juno relaxes, and smiles. “Yeah,” Juno says softly, “That’ll be good. We need a chance to… to properly catch up.”

And so they end up tangled in Nureyev’s bedsheets at 2am, Juno sitting up against the headboard, laughing, and Nureyev, lying in the sheets propped up with an elbow, in awe at this moment, in his part in making it happen. He wants to make Juno laugh again. He’d spend the rest of his life making Juno laugh if he got to see him like this.

The laugh dissolves into a sniggering, bubbly giggle. It’s far too ugly a sound for Nureyev to ever make himself, but he wants to keep it locked up in his heart to replay whenever he’s troubled. Peter is by no means a man of opulence and greed, but he’s always been sentimental – boxes of keepsakes he should by rights have destroyed stowed away in hidden places. His heart is a hidden place like any other, and this moment, he folds neatly up and presses away.

“I can’t believe that,” Juno says, wiping a tear from his eye, and Nureyev grins sharply.

“Oh, I know. It was the most embarrassing thing that has ever happened in my entire life.”

“I’m glad you trust me with your blackmail material.”

Nureyev laughs softly and leans over to rest his head against Juno’s stomach. He’s so soft, and his fingers reach over to stroke through his hair.

“Longer hair suits you,” he mutters.

“Mm. You’ve grown yours out as well. It looks nice. You look—great, Juno, I don’t think I’ve mentioned. You seem as though you’ve been doing very well for yourself.”

In his credit, he didn’t mean the bitter edge to seep into his tone. It was a slip of the tongue – he hadn’t even realised how far his walls had come down, how loose and relaxed he felt.

“Mm,” Juno shuffles down into the blankets so that he’s eye-level with Nureyev. “It wasn’t fun,” he tells him, “And I’m still getting there. I’ve been through… so much, Nureyev.”

Nureyev reaches out and cups his hand on the side of Juno’s face. “Tell me,” he whispers.

And Juno does. He tells Nureyev a story of politics and corruption, one Peter’s heard so many times before, but new again anyway because this is _Juno_. Juno, whose beautiful mind thinks so differently to his, whose jaw hardens when he talks about moral wrongs and whose eyes skitter away when he brushes over whichever parts of the story are still too tender to talk about. Peter ‘mhm’s and ‘ _no’_ s at the right moment and keeps stroking his face, utterly enraptured.

“It was just… time for me to leave,” Juno wraps up. A worried look possesses his face suddenly, and he reaches out to put his hand on Peter’s side, “I don’t want you to think you weren’t enough for me to leave. You were. God, Nureyev, what you offered me was… _everything._ But I wasn’t in the right place. I’m such a different person now. The lady who would’ve gone with you a year ago…”

“Shh, I know,” Nureyev mutters soothingly, “I know, Juno. I wouldn’t have been right for you either. I… am different, too. Not as drastically, but… I understand now that I wouldn’t have understood you enough for us to work. I would have been insensitive, I… couldn’t have given you what you gave yourself, with the help of Rita and your other friend—Mick.”

Juno’s expression is still frozen when he says quietly, “Does that mean…?”

“There’s nothing to forgive, Juno,” Peter tells him. “It was regrettable, and perhaps… could have been handled better… but the blame is hardly yours alone to share.” 

Juno’s eyes search his face for a moment. For dishonesty, perhaps, or regret. “That makes sense,” he says finally. “Okay. That makes sense.”

Nureyev smiles softly and leans forward. His lips alight on Juno’s forehead before his brain catches up to him, and he jolts back suddenly.

“Um,” he says. “Are you comfortable with me turning off the light? I’m quite tired, and our new heist starts tomorrow…”

“Yeah, Nureyev,” Juno says. There’s something in his voice that Nureyev can’t pin. It’s… soft. It’s a voice that’s seen a glimpse of the future and liked it, and Peter isn’t sure how to deal with that, so he doesn’t. He leans over and flicks off the light by the bed.

Darkness plunges into the room. Here is privacy, but also a new wave of anxiety in not being able to pinpoint Juno’s exact movements, reactions, expressions. Nureyev pushes down the rising wave of anxiety and shifts back into the blankets.

Juno cuddles up to him. It’s almost too much.

“Hey,” he says softly. “I want to thank you for tonight.”

“How do you mean?” Is Peter’s voice a little higher than usual? He can’t tell.

“Just… for talking to me. I get it’s probably not what you really wanted.”

“Well. It turned out alright in the end, didn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Juno says.

There’s silence for a beat. Then the blankets rustle and Nureyev feels the bed dip as Juno props himself up – and then kisses his cheek.

Nureyev doesn’t think. He turns his head towards Juno and kisses his cheek back.

There’s stillness for a moment. Peter can feel his heart fluttering in his chest. He’s not sure if this is what he wants, but then, he’d need years to find out what it really is that he does. And right now he has Juno, one warm arm slung over his chest, one leg between his own, leaning down to kiss the corner of his mouth.

“Juno…” Peter whispers.

“I…” Juno starts, and then stops. He’s hovering just above Peter’s face. Nureyev can feel his breath warm against his lips. Juno’s chest is pressed against his ribs, and Nureyev can feel the race of his heartbeat underneath his warm skin. “I don’t want to overstep. I get this is new, and we’re not really sure where we are yet, and if you don’t want to be involved like this—if it’s too messy for you, I understand. You just have to tell me. I’ll back off.”

Nureyev doesn’t know what to say. He says nothing. His mind is racing.

Juno lets out a breathy laugh. Nureyev feels it against his chest and his mouth. “God,” Juno says, “I feel so awkward. It’s like I’m a teen all over again. I should just… ask, right?”

And suddenly Nureyev’s brain clicks, like a cog snapping back into gear, and all the wheels start turning again and he says, “I’ll save you the trouble. The answer is yes.”

It takes a little bit of fumbling in the pitch blackness, a moment of breathy laughter from both of them – and their lips meet.

Nureyev’s eyes close and he basks himself in the sensation. He raises a hand to the side of Juno’s face, strokes a thumb over his unshaven jaw, and feels. Juno’s hand on his waist, his body pressed up against his. The kiss breaks and Juno sighs and Nureyev kisses him again because that had hardly been long enough, and he doesn’t want to deal with the aftermath, not yet.

He thinks he could stand it, if this is who Peter Nureyev turns out to be.

Peter lets his hand slide up into Juno’s hair, and Juno makes a soft, happy sound into Peter’s mouth. It’s not quite a moan, and the kiss is chaste, but still, Peter’s whole body sings.

When they break, they both breathe against each other’s lips, each too frozen in the moment to move away first. Then Juno breathes a rasping laugh and buries his head into Nureyev’s shoulder.

Nureyev hums, and wraps his arms as best he can around Juno’s back.

“I missed you, too,” he admits.

Juno shifts slightly so that he’s looking at Nureyev from the sheets beside him. His eyes have adjusted just enough for Nureyev to see his outline, the shine of his eye and his teeth as he smiles.

“We don’t…” he says, “We don’t have to put a name on this, yet.” His hand reaches out to tuck a strand of hair behind Nureyev’s ear and Nureyev presses his mouth to Juno’s wrist, and kisses him.

“Moving slowly does seem advisable,” he agrees.

“Even if… if you don’t want this again, for a while… if you need some space after tonight, to work things out, that’s okay,” Juno continues. “I think I’ve… well, I’ve made my position on the matter fairly clear. It’s… not changing any time soon.”

Nureyev smiles, and then closes his eyes. Feels Juno again, all the places that they’re touching. “Thank you, Juno.”

“Nothing to thank me for, Nureyev. I’m glad we’re doing it right this time.”

“As am I.”

They lie together, curled up and breathing against each other, for a long time. Peter feels like he’s overflowing – there’s a feeling taking up all the space in his chest, in his throat, in his mouth. He feels… warm. All over.

Juno shuffles in the sheets and then groans, “Hey, do you—” his voice raises in pitch towards the end, “Do you care if I take my shirt off? It’s really hot.”

Nureyev grins up at the ceiling, his eyes still closed. He could definitely get used to this life.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm not even joking this is 1000% how i expected the episode after man in glass to start. but vibert had 2 take it away from me smh my head thanks kevin you and your "character development" bullshit 
> 
> (im kidding ily kevin)

Nureyev has been awake for a while.

Juno knows, because his hand has been stroking small circles into Juno’s back for ages now. Juno should probably open his eyes, or make some signal at least that he’s awake, but…

He doesn’t want this to be over, just yet.

He knows he has to give Nureyev his time to process – he wouldn’t dream of taking it from him, either. But if that means that this is the last time in a while that Juno will get to have Nureyev’s hands on his skin and his head on Nureyev’s shoulder, then damn it, he’ll soak it up.

He also has a funny feeling Nureyev wouldn’t be doing it if he was awake.

This hypothesis is confirmed several minutes later when Juno decides he can’t in good conscience let this keep going, and makes a soft, waking-up sound, shuffling against Nureyev.

His hand falls still. When Juno opens his eye, Nureyev’s are closed, his head slack.

It would be cute if it wasn’t a little worrying, the way Nureyev feels like he can’t show affection to Juno if Juno knows it.

“Hey,” Juno mumbles. His throat is thicker than he expected, and his voice comes out scratched and muffled, “You awake?”

“Mmm,” is Nureyev’s response, and after a moment, he makes a show of pulling his eyes open and blinking up at Juno for a little bit. “Good morning.”

He is… so beautiful. Juno wants to kiss him so badly it hurts. But even if Juno hadn’t sworn off making the first move for a while, his teeth aren’t brushed, and he doesn’t want to subject Nureyev to that.

There’s a block in his mind that his thoughts are tiptoeing around. Juno thinks it might be guilt. Regret for how easy this seems now – waking up beside him, and how it should have happened so long ago.

“You sleep alright?” Juno asks instead, “Or did I crush you half to death?”

Nureyev snorts and leans his head back on the pillow, “I’m not as bird-boned as I look, Juno.”

“You sure? You’re about as wide as a hovercycle,” Juno pokes his stomach, “I could probably snap you in half.”

Is it his imagination, or is Nureyev’s answering sound almost flirtatious? ‘Is-that-so?’, it seems to say.

Juno decides… not to process that.

He probably definitely would’ve spent time processing that, if the next couple of minutes hadn’t gone so fast.

There came, all of a sudden, a flurry of rapid knocking at the door. And then two things happened simultaneously.

One: “Mistah Ransom! Mistah Ransom are you in there!? You gotta help, Mistah Steel’s gone missin’ and now he’s late for the meeting and so are you by the way but he ain’t in his room and he ain’t with the alcohol and I’m getting’ really worried and Buddy said you might know where he is which don’t make no sense but I’m askin’ anyway an—”

Two: “Oh, _fuck_ , Rita can’t see me in here,” Juno hisses, and pulls the sheets up to hide his bare chest, “Where’s my shirt?”

“Don’t—don’t worry about that, go… stand in the cupboard, or something—” Nureyev pulls the sheet down from him, “I’ll tell her I haven’t seen you and she’ll be out again in no time.”

“I’m not hiding in your _goddamn_ closet, Nureyev,” Juno growls back, and then—

The door opens.

“Your door ain’t even locked Mistah— _Steel?!_ HHHHH!” Rita slaps her hands over her mouth and the door closes again.

“Rita—” Juno raises his voice to warn her.

“It’s alright Mistah Steel! I didn’t realise you and Mistah Ransom were _friends_ like that, that’s all! Even if it does kind of make sense the way you two’ve been looking at each other and— I’m sorry for interrupting I’ll leave now bye!” she says through the door, all in one breath and at the top of her lungs, and then there’s the sound of her speed-walking away.

Nureyev falls backwards onto the sheets and covers his face with his hands, “Fantastic. I wonder how many of the Carte Blanche’s members heard _that_ little announcement.”

“I better go stop her before she tells Buddy,” Juno mutters, and searches frantically for his shirt in the tangle of bedsheets.

“Here.”

Juno turns to find Nureyev, sitting up and with Juno’s shirt in his hand – but he can’t really concentrate on that with Nureyev’s own shirt open and hanging off one shoulder in a way that should really be illegal.

Nureyev catches him staring. He smiles mischievously, one corner of his mouth curling up and his teeth just showing, and throws Juno’s shirt at him.

Juno catches it and pulls it over his head. “Sorry for this,” he says, when he resurfaces.

“For putting your shirt back on? I forgive you, even if it does mean I can no longer enjoy the view.”

Juno laughs awkwardly and glances away from him. His arms come closer to his stomach almost on instinct, protecting himself from scrutiny. “Yeah. Right. I meant… Rita.”

Nureyev sighs and rolls his perfect eyes, “You have quite the taste in secretary, I’ll give you that.”

“Think she’s technically my superior officer now, or something. Look, I’ll talk to her later, explain that we’re not—”

He finds he can’t find the words to describe what, exactly, they’re _not_. Saying they’re not sleeping together makes it sound like he’s taking that off the table, and he’s… definitely not doing that.

“—we weren’t,” he decides on, “together like that. Last night.”

There’s silence between them. Juno clears his throat.

“Okay, well I’m going to go find her,” he stands up from the bed and stares awkwardly around the room for a second before looking back at Nureyev and adding, “Um—thanks. For last night. We’ll… talk more soon, I hope.”

Nureyev smiles at him softly, a strange kind of look on his face, as though he knows something Juno doesn’t, “Yes, Juno. I think we will.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> did i really just throw this fic together even tho its badly written just so i had an excuse to be soft on main? yeah

**Author's Note:**

> there will be a chapter 2 of this so stay tuned!!! or come yell at me on twitter at @onetiredb0y


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